Why “Criminals” Should Have Rights

Is Darryl Howard another victim of a justice system biased against the accused? You make the call:

Now, newly discovered evidence further argues for Howard’s innocence. In court papers filed this week, the Innocence Project reveals that DNA testing of a rape kit taken from Doris Washington found some sperm that went undetected during the initial investigation. That sperm is a match to a career criminal, not to Howard. Attorneys for Howard have also uncovered evidence that prosecutors in the case may have withheld important exculpatory evidence, including a credible statement from an informant days after the murder who attributed the crimes to a local gang, not to Darryl Howard.

Discovery of the memo, which was known to police and should have been known to prosecutors, shows that the state failed to turn over relevant evidence pointing to Howard’s innocence. But the contents of the memo also suggest that Howard’s prosecutor not only put on perjurious testimony from a police investigator, he then used that evidence to give false statements in court himself.